


Unsung Lullabies

by jellybeanforest



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel 3490
Genre: Canon Multiverse, Cap-Ironman Bingo, Depression, F/M, Farewells, Female!Tony Stark, Hopeful Ending, Infertility, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Sad Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:07:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25624126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jellybeanforest/pseuds/jellybeanforest
Summary: In Earth-3490, the Avengers Civil War is averted when Captain America, Steve Rogers, and Iron Woman, Natasha Stark, fall in love and marry. What should have been the start of their happily-ever-after takes a devastating turn when Steve and Tasha suffer a loss.For the Cap-IronMan Bingo 2020 Round 1 – Last Times/Farewells
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Natasha Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Kudos: 66
Collections: Captain America/Iron Man Bingo





	Unsung Lullabies

**Author's Note:**

> In the comics, there’s an alternate universe Marvel-3490 where Civil War is averted when Captain America falls in love with and marries Iron Woman, Natasha Stark (basically a gender-bent alternate version of Tony Stark).
> 
> Trigger warning for infertility and late miscarriage (specifically at 20 weeks) due to implied cervical incompetence.

Tasha curls up small on the cot in her lab, cradling her empty belly, her body shaking with an ache both physical and emotional. She has survived a lot: her parents’ untimely deaths, the raging benders that followed, Uncle Obie’s betrayal, _Afghanistan._ Starks are made of iron, her father had always said, and Tasha did not disappoint.

Until now.

Here she is, the Iron Woman, brought to her knees by three tablespoons of ash housed in a cardboard box.

She has never wanted a drink more in her life.

And so, she had locked herself away in her lab, purportedly to work on some upgrades to her suit after four months of disuse. It will keep her busy, keep her sane, or so she says. Really, she hadn’t wanted the others to see, to hear, not even–

“Captain Rogers is at the door,” J.A.R.V.I.S. informs her. “He is requesting access.”

She considers denying his request before looking over at the box on the table. It wouldn’t be fair, to keep Steve away from him.

“Access granted, J.”

She doesn’t turn around when she hears Steve enter nor when he approaches and brushes her tangled hair from the side of her face and then down as well, cradling her from behind.

Uncontrollable spasms bubble up out of her chest as she breaks into a keening wail.

Steve shushes her, rubbing a hand over her stomach as had become his habit in recent months. “It’s okay, Tasha. We’ll be okay.”

“I’m sorry, Steve. I’m so sorry–”

“It wasn’t your fault. It was no one’s fault.”

Tasha knows that. It’s what the doctors had told them. It was just a bad hand, a biological quirk, manageable when caught early.

It hadn’t been caught early.

It isn’t her fault, but it had been her body that couldn’t keep him, that failed to hold onto him when he had been too small to survive on his own. Though the guilt is illogical, he had been hers, and she had lost him.

Tasha had thought she knew all the world’s most horrible sounds: the whirr of a car battery buried deep in her chest, the crunch of vibranium against titanium alloy, the glug of Howard’s fifth scotch before he flew into one of his rages, but none of those even come close to holding a candle to the strong heartbeat of a healthy baby who doesn’t know he’s doomed.

The loss hurts, but underneath is the more insidious, bone-deep fear. “What if… what if he’s the only one we get?” she whispers before her words dissolve into gasping, choking sobs.

It had taken years to conceive, and she didn’t have many good years left.

Steve deserves to be a father.

“He’s not, sweetheart. There are other ways… other things we can try,” Steve murmurs. After three years of trying, he had mentioned surrogacy, adoption… but Tasha hadn’t been ready to give up just yet, and after one last try, she had conceived what she thought had been her dream, their miracle baby.

And now their dream has turned to ash.

“Are you… are you familiar with multi-verse theory?” she manages, her fingers drawing swirls on the back of Steve’s hand, a figure eight, the symbol of infinity. “It’s a theory that all possibilities are happening at once, simultaneously and in parallel. In some universes, one or both of us don’t exist, you know. Maybe I die in the cave or you die in the war, or– or maybe even earlier in childhood. In some… well, in some, we don’t meet, and in others, we do, but we don’t fall in love. Maybe there are universes where we’re both women or both men.” There’s a pause, as she sucks in a steadying breath. “But in some, in the best timelines, we both are as we are. We– we are born, meet, and fall in love, and in an infinite subset of those, our son survives, and we get to keep him.”

“Tasha–”

“It’s just not this universe,” she whispers softly. She dissolves into tears then, the pitch of her sobs high like a wounded animal clawing out from her chest.

Steve doesn’t know what to do; he can only hold her tightly, hold her together as they both mourn the death of a miracle.

* * *

**Six Months Later**

Tasha had snuck down into the lab to view it again. Steve still didn’t know about the device. She feels guilty for keeping secrets from her husband, but she tells herself this is the last time. One last look, and then she’ll shut it down forever.

That’s what she promised herself last time, too.

The Natasha on screen is sleepy, her closed eyes bunching at the soft cry. She prods her husband beside her. “Your turn, honey.”

Screen-Steve groans. “Again? It’s only been like three hours,” he mumbles.

“Your. Turn.”

He drags himself up, ambling zombie-like around their bed to reach the bassinet on Tasha’s side. He leans over, his arms outstretched–

“What are you doing?” Steve asks.

But his voice isn’t coming from the screen.

Tasha turns to see Steve in his nightclothes, staring at himself on the screen, rocking their infant son, so small in his large arms.

“Is that–”

“They named him Morgan,” Tasha says weakly. She knows what Steve is thinking. It’s unhealthy to obsess over their loss. It’s creepy and voyeuristic, and she should never have built a window into the multiverse to spy on their alternate selves…

Or at the very least, she should have shared her invention with Steve.

He tears his eyes away from the projection to stare at Tasha, the light from the images on the screen dancing across her guilty face. “Tasha–”

“I miss him, alright?” she admits, her voice low. “He was our baby, and I– I just wanted to see him. I wanted to see our son, what he could have been. He has your nose and my eyes, and well… look at him,” she looks back at the baby, suckling on a bottle alternate Steve holds up for him.

Steve’s eyes flick to the screen but just as quickly return to his wife. He draws closer, wrapping his arms around Tasha in a comforting embrace. “He isn’t our son, sweetheart. He isn’t the one we lost,” he says softly. “He belongs to them, and we get a different life.” One hand slips down to palm her stomach. “Another child. They get to have him, but this one is ours.”

Tasha rests her hand over his. “I know, Steve. I know. I just… I carried him. I miss him, and I– I don’t know… I just wanted… I wanted to see that we could have made him happy. In another life.”

“Come to bed, sweetheart. Please.”

“Alright.”

Tasha allows him to lead her back upstairs, back to their bedroom where the bassinet, the same model used by their son in a mirror universe, sits unassembled in their closet. Steve glances back at his doppelganger yawning and holding their son. Steve has never been the type to dwell on what-if’s, but if he had been…

“J.A.R.V.I.S., could you please shut down the program?” he asks the AI. “I think we’re done for the night.”

“Of course, Captain Rogers.”

**Author's Note:**

> Just squeaked this in before the Bingo deadline.
> 
> Though rarer than early miscarriage, late miscarriage can be particularly difficult as it often occurs after what people think of as the window of danger (first 12 weeks) and is usually a result of infection that kills the baby and/or anatomical irregularities in the mother that causes her body to not hold on to an otherwise healthy pregnancy. Often, the only options are induction to expel the fetus (a process similar to childbirth) or dilation and evacuation under general anesthesia (a process similar to late-term abortion), but if it’s too early, the fetus doesn’t survive either. After seventeen weeks, the baby is often large enough to need cremation/burial afterwards. Many women do go on to have successful pregnancies after miscarriage (with many being extra fertile in the first few months after), especially if the reason for the initial miscarriage is addressed, but subsequent pregnancies are often fraught with fear and paranoia.


End file.
